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Young Man About Town

By all accounts, Craig Blass was living the high life, and he loved it. Bachelor parties in Las Vegas, summer weekends in the Hamptons, the social scene in the city. But there was one other thing he really liked to do that always seemed to surprise people. "He loved to go shopping with me," said Mr. Blass's mother, Barbara Blass. "My friends would say, 'He still shops with you?' And I'd say, 'Oh, yes.' "

He splurged on himself, his mother and others because "he was living the good life, making good money and spending it because he made it," Mrs. Blass said. Mr. Blass, 27, worked as an institutional stock trader for Cantor Fitzgerald. He grew up in Greenlawn, on Long Island, and cheered for the New Jersey Devils hockey team. If he was not out at an athletic event or socializing, he could probably be found on his mother's couch, flipping through the sports channels with his younger brother and their father. He also loved to gamble.

"That was one of his joys," Mrs. Blass said. "But I guess if you work on Wall Street you have that in you, you gamble all the time."

Profile published in THE NEW YORK TIMES on September 30, 2001.